1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a hinge mechanism for hinging the housings of a foldable, portable electronic device, and more especially, to a hinge mechanism with simple structures for easy assembling.
2. The Related Art
Nowadays, electronic devices that are portable, such as digital cameras, mobile phones, etc., are widely used. To facilitate portability, it is known to make an electronic device foldable so that the electronic device can be more compact when two portions of the electronic device are foldable upon themselves. Portable electronic devices that utilize this type of design usually have most or all of the electronics within the larger portion, herein after called the body portion. The smaller portion will hereinafter be called the flip element.
A variety of hinge mechanisms have been used to rotatably couple the flip element to the body portion. One such hinge mechanism, as shown in FIG. 12, has a sleeve 124 integrally formed at an end of the flip element 104. The sleeve 124 has a close end with a shaft 127 extending therefrom and an open end 122. The hinge mechanism also comprises a spring 116, a cam 118, and a follower 120 assembled into the sleeve 124 via the open end 122 thereof. A pair of shoulders is formed at an end of the body portion 102 and defines a recess 103 therebetween for the sleeve 124 riding therein. Two shaft cavities 107 are respectively defined in the shoulders. When assembling, the shaft 127 is inserted into one shaft cavity 107. Then the follower 120 projected out from the sleeve 124 is inserted into the other shaft cavity 107 by means of a special tool.
FIG. 13 discloses another hinge mechanism of the prior art including two shaft cavities 2110 in the flip element 2000 and a module 1050 assembled to the body portion. A pair of shafts 21 is disposed at opposite ends of the module 1050. When assembling, however, a special tool for inserting the shafts 21 into the shaft cavities 2110 is also required.
As described above, in the prior art, the shaft cavities for holding the shafts are both integrally molded with the flip element or the body portion, so a special tool is inevitably needed to help to insert the shafts into the shafts cavities. Therefore, the assembly of prior hinge mechanisms is both clumsy and time consuming. As the same reason, disassembling of those hinge mechanisms is also difficult, which make maintenance of the electronic devices inconvenient.